


Illusions: Perspectives

by ItalianHobbit



Series: The Princes of Ered Luin [6]
Category: The Hobbit - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Gen, supplemental to a larger story
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-01
Updated: 2015-01-31
Packaged: 2018-03-09 22:15:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,006
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3266318
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ItalianHobbit/pseuds/ItalianHobbit
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Random scenes set in my fic Illusions from the perspectives of other characters than Kíli. Just little bits of extra content I wrote to help me along, but I figured I'd share.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Perspectives

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Illusions](https://archiveofourown.org/works/900601) by [ItalianHobbit](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ItalianHobbit/pseuds/ItalianHobbit). 

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So, I have a decent amount of extra material I wrote while writing Illusions to help myself out with other perspectives. I figured some of you might want to read it, too. This one you might find familiar; it was formerly chapter 15 of Illusions, but I took it out because I didn't like it there. Now it's here if you'd like to read it again! This is set just after chapter 14, in which Kíli is rescued from being drowned by Fíli and decides he doesn't really care about anything anymore if he can't have his brother.

**Thorin**

Thorin was lost.

Loss was not new to Thorin – he had lost many that he held dear. His father, Thrain. His grandfather, Thror. His brother, Frerin. Countless friends and kin in the sack of Erebor, wandering in the wilderness, and everything that unfolded thereafter. But nothing, absolutely nothing, could compare to the loss of the lights of his life – his sun and his moon – his Fíli and his Kíli.

Betrayal burned hot, burning, scalding through Thorin's veins. He knew that Fíli didn't know who he was, that he was afraid and angry, but he could not stop the flood of betrayal that throbbed in his head and made his hands shake when he dwelt upon it for too long. The  _treason,_  the  _treachery_  that Fíli had committed – Thorin could not even wrap his mind around it. The one person who had vowed to protect Kíli with his life had been the one to nearly bring about his demise. Never, in all the ages of Middle-Earth, would Thorin have thought such a thing possible. Fíli was stalwart and steadfast, always loyal and always dependable. He was a rock, never swaying from the path that Thorin laid out for him. But no longer. His sun – his golden-haired boy with eyes the color of the sky – was gone, and a dark-eyed monster had taken his place.

And Kíli knew it. His young nephew, so full of vibrant joy in the darkest of times, had given up. He had said next to nothing, but Thorin could see it in his eyes. The light had died. Kíli knew what Thorin had been trying to ignore – Fíli was gone, and there was little hope of bringing him back. Whatever had happened out there in that cave seemed to be permanent, and Kíli knew it. He had held on to hope for so long, and now his faith had been completely and utterly destroyed, leaving nothing but a broken shell where a bright light once had been. Fíli had taken any and all hope with him into the creek, and nothing had come back out.

Thorin hated what he saw in his nephews' eyes. He hated the anger and hatred that burned in Fíli's unnaturally dark gaze. He hated the dead, lost look that shadowed Kíli's face. Fíli and Kíli were still with him in body, but in spirit he had lost them both – and that was what hurt the most. He could see them, hear them, touch them, smell them, but still they were not there. They were lost, and without them, Thorin had been deprived of the light of his life. He felt more lost himself than he ever had, even in the years following the sack of Erebor or the Battle of Azanulbizar. The sun and the moon were gone, and the stars were veiled from his sight; there was nothing left for Thorin in the dark and weary land.

For the first time his long life, Thorin did not know what to do.

* * *

**Dís**

Never had Dís thought that it would come to this.

Fíli was her golden boy, whose long blond waves reminded her every day of the husband she had lost. In the weeks and months following his death, she had often sneaked into Fíli and Kíli's bedroom in the night hours as they slept and stroked that beautiful hair, weeping. Fíli would never wake, heavy sleeper as he was, but sometimes her quiet sniffles would wake Kíli. He would lift his unruly mop of hair and look up at his mother with impossibly wide brown eyes that seemed identical to her husband's, and Dís would weep all the more; then the toddler would untangle himself from his brother's arms and snuggle up in Dís's lap, wrapping his tiny arms as far as he could around her torso. There he would fall asleep again, his head resting on her bosom, and she would smile through her tears and kiss his dark little head.

Those nights were more precious to her than gold. Through all the hurt and loss she had endured, she had her two boys, her promises of joy in dark times, and she had thought that nothing could have stolen that from her.

But she had been wrong.

When Kíli had brought Fíli back unconscious, fear had ravaged Dís's heart. Her entire run home after her encounter with Gimli had been a terrible storm of  _what-if_ s that shook her to the core. She would not lose her golden boy, her eldest, so strong and proud, yet gentle and humble. Not then. Not ever. And then to learn of his condition when she came home – it had almost been too much. Fíli's screams had pierced her heart and left it open and bleeding. She had cried for a long time in Thorin's strong arms as he held her close and stroked her hair, kissing the top of her head and whispering promises.  _We will fix this. We will solve this. Do not despair, Sister._

She had held on to that promise, but things had only gotten worse. Fíli had not recovered. He was frightened and alone, and he was lashing out – but there was something darker, more sinister beneath that, and it frightened her. She had seen the fear in Thorin's eyes, and she knew that he understood the same. She hated seeing her firstborn in a jail cell, his shining braids dirty and disheveled, and a snarl upon his fair face. He was hiding his fear, she knew; Fíli couldn't hide the tear tracks on his face and the way he held his pillow while he slept. She longed to gather him in her arms and hold him tight, to tell him  _it's all right; we will solve this_ , but he would scorn her embrace. He had pushed everyone away.

She had been so proud of Kíli. He was stubborn, to be sure – foolishly so – but his unwavering love and support for his brother was admirable. Even in the midst of his foolishness, running off to confront whatever deplorable creature had harmed Fíli, she had been proud. He was rash and reckless, but it came out of a love and loyalty that reminded her sharply of Frerin. Thorin, of course, had always been analytical and introspective, but Frerin had been much like Kíli was now. Fiercely loyal and proud, overflowing with love and a foolish optimism.

Perhaps that was what killed him in the end. Dís knew that she should not encourage such behavior, but she missed Frerin, and she would not relinquish what brought him to mind. Kíli was Kíli, and she would have nothing less. That was why the dying light in her youngest's eyes pierced her so deeply.

When Óin had finally let her in to speak to her baby boy, she had not expected the dull, hopeless look that clouded Kíli's gaze. Without his brother, Kíli was lost and alone and without purpose. It terrified her and it rent her heart. No longer did her cheerful, beautiful, reckless boy peer out from behind those eyes. All that remained was a shell whose soul had been ripped out and left in the water. Though he had not said it, Dís could see it in his eyes:  _I would rather be dead._

So both Fíli and Kíli were gone. She had her boys in body, but not in spirit, and she longed for them. For each other's sake, but also for her brother's sake. They were the lights of his life, and without them, Dís feared for his mind. They had both lost so much – perhaps she even more, with her husband dead – but it weighed heavier on Thorin's shoulders. He felt a greater part of the weight of responsibility for all that had happened, and he held grief close to the heart and did not let go.

But most of all, perhaps selfishly, Dís needed her sons back for herself. No mother was meant to lose her children, in body or in spirit. She needed her boys for so many reasons. She needed the joy they brought to her life; she needed the love and affection they gave; she needed the living memories of those she had lost. She needed Fíli and Kíli simply because they were Fíli and Kíli, and they were irreplaceable.

She needed a solution, but she had none. All she knew to do was to be there for the family she had left, broken or not. She would bring food and kindness to Fíli, regardless of how he treated her. She would love and care for Kíli, though he no longer cared for himself. She would be a support for Thorin, though she was crumbling inside. She was a Dwarf, after all, and a woman besides. She would carry the weight with love and longsuffering – to whatever end.

* * *

**Fíli**

Darkness pressed in on every side, and Fíli was terrified.

There were no memories in Fíli's mind. Nothing that stretched beyond the past few days, anyhow. All he could remember was waking up, being restrained and confined, and then when he tried to escape, he was drugged and he woke up in jail. There he had been ever since, and things had only gotten worse since then. Someone - probably their leader, Thorin - had clearly arranged shifts so that someone was at the jail, staring at him and making sure that he didn't try to escape. It was infuriating. He hated their stares. They were not his company. They were his guards.

He was alone.

Anything beyond waking up screaming three days before was locked behind a thick, dark wall in Fíli's mind. He had no idea who he was or where he was from. He didn't know if he had any family or where they might be. Why was he here? How had he lost his memories? Where was he before? He had a suspicion that his jailers had something to do with it, and he didn't trust them in the slightest. Whatever they had done to him had worked, and that was what terrified him the most.

He had a vague memory of some horror happening in Kíli's presence - he could remember screaming and cowering in the corner of the jail cell, but not much more. If it were possible to trust him any less than he did the others, he would. Thorin may have been the leader, but it was clearly Kíli who had started it all. The young dwarf had some kind of power that Fíli could not comprehend, and though he refused to show it, he was afraid of him. At the same time, however, he felt such a strong animosity towards the brunet that the mere sight of him was enough to make Fíli want to snuff the light out of his wide brown eyes. He tried to keep him away with insults and threats of violence - which seemed to work for a little while, at least - but Kíli was determined. Whatever he had started, he wanted to finish it.

That was the reason he had tried to kill the stupid young dwarf. He had seemed so cunning at first, but Fíli had quickly realized that Kíli thought his tricks had worked, and Fíli would 'remember' him as his brother. He doubted Kíli was even the dwarf's real name - just another trick to try to fool him. But he wasn't fooled. The idea had come to him suddenly. If he pretended the trick had worked, Kíli would probably let him out; it hadn't taken him long to figure out that he was a rash and reckless dwarf, and Kíli had played perfectly into his trap. Of course, he knew that Kíli would try to follow him, which was why he beat him before running away - but clearly he hadn't beaten him enough, and Fíli had had to resort to more drastic measures. He hadn't expected anyone to find them, though, and that one factor had foiled his entire plan. Kíli was still alive and he was back in jail under an even more severe watch than before.

So now he was trapped. These people who claimed to be his kin kept him locked up and under watch. They could try to lie to him and 'bring him around', but he refused to fall for their lies. Family didn't do this to family. They were cunning and crafty, these people, and he meant to keep them out of his head as much as he could. They pretended to be worried and sad, but he knew they weren't. They hated him, and they wanted him to suffer.

If Fíli could have his own way, he would be far from these people. He didn't know where he would go or what he would do, but he wanted as much distance between him and them - especially Kíli - as possible. He just wished he could remember where he had come from. Surely someone missed him. Somebody out there somewhere was wondering where he was and when he would return. He longed to find somewhere safe, with people he loved and trusted, but he had no idea where to start or if he would ever find them at all. For all he knew, he was far from home, but in the inky darkness of his mind, he could not recall where any other dwarves would be. He was stuck here, with darkness and angry glares and indescribable fear for company.

Fíli felt so alone.


	2. Betrayal

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This bit is set during/after chapter 19 of Illusions (in which Kíli knocks Thorin out and busts Fíli out of jail) and continues through quite a bit of the story. It's just to show you what was happening from Thorin and Dís's end while Fíli and Kíli were missing!

"Kí-li…"

Thorin opened his eyes slowly. His head ached fiercely, and he tried to move, but his body would not respond. Through the fog that plagued his vision, Thorin could see Kíli staring back at him, his brown eyes shining. A sharp, icy dagger went through his heart when he saw those eyes—he knew what those eyes were saying. He could feel it.

_I've betrayed you._

"He won't be able to move yet," Kíli said in a loud whisper. "Get outside. We only have a few minutes."

Thorin blinked lethargically and searched the darkness and the fog for whoever Kíli was talking to; then he saw him. Fíli, free from his cell, pulling against Kíli's grip on his arm. Two and two came together, and suddenly Thorin felt sick. Kíli's eyes held no lie—he was betraying his uncle. He was betraying his family.

He was running away, and he was taking Fíli with him.

He tried to speak, but his voice would not work, and his lips moved soundlessly. Kíli and Fíli ran out the door of the jail, leaving Thorin alone on the dirt floor.

"K-Kí…Kíli," he slurred, putting all his effort into moving and yet managing only to wildly fling his arm forward. His thoughts weren't working—nothing was working. He dropped his head back onto the ground and squeezed his eyes shut, willing away the ache in his head. His throat hurt. What had Kíli done to him? All he could remember was Kíli saying he was sorry, and then—

The ether. Kíli had somehow gotten his hands on Óin's ether, and he had used it to break his brother out of jail. An inarticulate shout sounded from Thorin's lips, and tears sprang to his eyes. The fool—the  _damned_  fool! Would that boy never learn? Would he  _always_  be rash and reckless? He had set loose the shadow of the brother he had once had—who had tried to kill him on multiple occasions. Was was he  _thinking_?

Desperately, Thorin tried to get his limbs moving; they responded better than before, but he still could not control his movements. The fog clouded not just his vision, but his mind, and he groaned, trying to push it away. He had to get up. He had to go after Kíli. He would  _not_  lose him. He couldn't.

After several minutes of hard work, Thorin finally managed to push himself to his feet. He stumbled to the door and flung it open, searching wildly to the left and the right. No sign of either of his nephews.

" _Kíli_!" he bellowed.

There was no response. Of  _course_  there was no reponse. They were probably running off at top speed—if Fíli had not already killed Kíli and stashed his body somewhere nearby. Thorin's heart sank like a stone. Why would Kíli do this?

" _Kíli_!" Thorin called again. He looked around desperately, looking for some kind of sign, some indication of where his nephews had gone. There was nothing. He panted raggedly, wobbling on his still unsteadly legs.

"Thorin!" called a voice from his right. Thorin looked up, hoping it was Kíli and yet at the same time knowing that it wasn't. That wasn't Kíli's voice. Bofur came running towards him, the flaps of his hat bouncing. Thorin attempted to take a step towards him and instead fell to his knees. Bofur knelt in front of him.

"Thorin, what's happened?" he said, reaching out to help his king back up. Thorin grabbed hold of his arms and pulled himself unsteadily to his feet.

"Kíli, he's—he's gone," he said. "He's gone, Bofur—he left. He took Fíli."

Bofur's eyes grew wide, and he stared at Thorin, his brows drawn apart. His mouth opened and closed several times before he could speak.

"Where did they go?" he said.

"I don't know," Thorin said brokenly. "He knocked me out and ran off." He searched Bofur's eyes frantically. "You didn't see them? You didn't see which way they went?"

"I only came out because I heard you," Bofur said. "I didn't see anyone, Thorin. I'm sorry."

"We have to find them," Thorin said. He pushed Bofur's hands away and turned, searching his surroundings once more. "We have to find them—before something happens to Kíli. Before something happens to either one of them."

"Whoa, wait!" Bofur said, grabbing hold of Thorin as he stumbled once more. "We can't just run off—we need help, Thorin. They could be anywhere."

"I know, but what if—what if…" he trailed off and bowed his head, blinking back tears. He wouldn't cry. Not in front of Bofur.  _Pull yourself together,_  he told himself. "I need to find them."

"You can barely walk, Thorin!" Bofur countered. "Let's get you home, and I'll round up some others. Let's go."

Thorin nodded reluctantly and leaned against Bofur, and together they made it back to Thorin's home. By the time they reached his front door, Thorin had better control of himself, and he ran ahead of Bofur and burst in the front door.

"Dís!" he called. "Dís, where are you?"

Dís came running down the hall at her brother's call and caught him as he stumbled into a chair. He sat heavily, and Dís pulled up a chair and sat beside him.

"Thorin, what's happened?" she said.

"Kíli," he said, his voice cracking. "Kíli, he's—he's gone."

"No, Thorin, he's fine," Dís said, taking hold of her brother's arm.. "What are you talking about? He's in his room resting."

"No, no—he's not," Thorin said. "He took Fíli, Dís. He took Fíli and ran off. He knocked me out with ether and broke him out."

Dís's grip tightened on Thorin's arm. "What?"

"We have to find them, Dís," Thorin said. "We have to bring them back, before something happens. I don't know—I don't know what he was  _thinking_ …"

Dís stood up and ran to Fíli and Kíli's room, slamming the door open.

"Kíli!" she shouted, but there was no reply. She turned around and sat back down next to her brother.

"We'll find them," she said brusquely. She looked up to Bofur, who stood in the doorway awkwardly. "Bofur, get Balin, Dwalin, Óin, and Glóin. We're going to arrange a search party."

Thorin heard the door shut, and he dropped his head into his hands and groaned. Dís laid a hand on his arm.

"Are you all right?" she said.

"No, I am  _not_ ," Thorin said. He felt the tears well up in his eyes again, and try as he might to blink them back, he could not; they spilled down his face, and he gasped tearfully. "Dís, why would he do this? Why would he do this to me? To us?"

Dís wrapped her arms around her brother, and Thorin reciprocated; they sat quietly for a moment before Dís spoke.

"You know how he is," she said. "He would do anything for Fíli—just like Fíli would do anything for him."

"But he  _knows_  what Fíli is capable of," Thorin said. "Surely he has suffered enough at his brother's hands—"

"You know that doesn't matter," Dís said. "He's stubborn—even more than you. He would never give up on Fíli."

"I didn't  _ask_  him to give up!" Thorin said, suddenly pounding his fist on the table. Dís jumped back and stared at her brother. "I asked him to  _rest_ , to  _recover_ , and I would do everything in my power to fix whatever is wrong with Fíli!"

"Is there anything that he said to you recently?" said Dís. "Anything at all that would indicate where he might go?"

"No," Thorin said, shaking his head. Then, after a moment's deliberation, he said, "Just before he—before he knocked me out, he was asking me about taking Fíli somewhere to help him get better."

"Did he say where?"

"No, he did not." Thorin groaned and dropped his head into his hands. "The _fool_ …"

"They can't have gone far," Dís said. "Not yet. We'll find them, Thorin."

"But  _where_  did they go?" said Thorin, meeting his sister's eyes. "They may not have gone far, but we have no idea which direction they went."

"Our cousins will be here soon," said Dís. "We'll split up and search."

Thorin merely bowed his head.

* * *

Despite all the efforts that Thorin, Dís, and their cousins made, Fíli and Kíli could not be found.

After the first few days, Thorin had called upon more dwarves to find his nephews. Bofur had called in his brother, Bombur, and even his cousin, Bifur, on the hunt; Dís has asked for the help of Dori and Ori—and they had even called upon Nori to help. Thorin had interrogated everyone he could think of—anyone who had spoken to Kíli since this entire ordeal began. Gimli's idea was that they had gone back to the cave, and a search party had been sent that way fruitlessly. No one else had any idea what had been going through Kíli's mind.

The only possible lead had been Bofur and Bombur. Thorin thought that maybe that night that he had sent Kíli off to relax with his friends, one of the two had said something to him; but neither could recall saying anything of consequence.

"I don't know, Thorin," Bofur had said. "We got drunk and we had some laughs. I don't know."

Thorin had more than half a mind to shake him to death. The only reason he was still standing was because Dís had intervened.

A week passed with no word or sign from either Fíli or Kíli, and Thorin was starting to lose hope. He had sent people as far as the Shire, and still no one had seen or heard of two Dwarves passing with two ponies. No signs had been found of the travelers, but no one had found any bodies, either; Thorin could only hope that they would be found or return on their own.

Then the ponies returned.

Thorin was inside speaking with Dwalin when he heard Dís scream. Instantly both he and Dwalin were on their feet and out the door; Dís was kneeling on the ground, sobbing, and Thorin knelt before his sister and took her face in his hands.

"Dís, what's happened?" he said anxiously.

"They're gone, they're gone, they're never coming back to me," she sobbed.

"We'll find them, Dís—you said it yourself," Thorin said, confused.

"No, they—they've been lost, something happened to them, Thorin!" she cried, pointing behind her brother. "The ponies—the ponies!"

Thorin's heart stopped, and he turned around. All the blood seemed to drain out of him completely as he beheld Fíli and Kíli's ponies, riderless, placidly walking towards the house. Ropes dangled from their reins, clearly cut by some knife. Dís clawed at Thorin's sleeve.

"My boys, my boys, Thorin, my boys!" she whimpered. "What happened to them?"

"Dwalin, see if there are any clues on them," Thorin ordered. He turned his attention back to his sister and wrapped his arms around her; she buried her face into his neck and sobbed violently, and he filtered his fingers into her hair and held her close.

"There's nothing here," Dwalin called. Thorin closed his eyes and pressed his lips together, feeling his heart sink down into the ground.

"Nothing at all?" he called back, keeping a tight hold on his little sister.

"Wait—there's—Thorin, there's blood!"

An agonized wail came from Dís, and Thorin kissed her hair and did not let go.

"It might not be Fíli and Kíli's," Thorin whispered to her.

"It's orc blood!" Dwalin called.

This did not comfort Dís in the slightest. She wailed again, a long, anguished cry that wound down through Thorin's shoulder into his heart and rested there, aching.

"Is that all?" he called to Dwalin. His friend jogged over and knelt beside the king and princess.

"It's not a lot," Dwalin said. "And I don't see any blood from Fíli or Kíli here."

Dís was inconsolable. Her body shook violently with sobs, and Thorin's eyes filled with tears. At any other time, he would have held them back, but there was no reason now. He rocked his sister gently and kissed her hair again.

"Thank you, Dwalin," he said. "Please—if you could leave us."

His own eyes shining with tears, Dwalin nodded and stood to his feet. Thorin heard him pull the ponies back into their stalls, and then the two were alone, the two remaining heirs, with no one behind them—and now no one before them either.


	3. Responsibility

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This bit is from chapter 29, in which Fíli and Kíli argue about when would be a good time to head for home from Tom and Goldberry's. This is the conversation that Kíli heard the end of when Fíli thought he wasn't around.

Fíli looked up at his little brother affectionately.

"Kíli, I will be  _fine_ ," he said. "You don't need to hover."

Kíli made a small sound of protest. "I'm not hovering, I'm just—"

"Kíli," Fíli said. He smiled. "You're hovering. Don't worry about me. Go find something to do for a while. I'll be all right here."

"But—"

"Kíli,  _go_ ," said Fíli. "Please stop worrying."

Kíli straightened, frowning, but Fíli could see the relief in his eyes. "All right. I'll find something to do. I'll… I'll go find Tom." He departed quickly, leaving Fíli alone with Goldberry. She smiled down at him.

"Shall we begin?" she said.

Fíli nodded and pulled off his tunic, revealing the healing wound on his stomach, and then leaned back, wincing as his sore abdomen protested. Goldberry watched him carefully.

"How are you feeling?" she said.

"I'm fine," Fíli said, ignoring the voice in his head that whispered  _liar_. "Better every day."

Goldberry smiled her mysterious smile and looked at him sternly. "I am not your brother, Fíli… you do not have to lie to me," she said.

So it wasn't going to work on her, then. Not that Fíli had expected it would—but it had been worth a try. He dropped his façade instantly and dropped his head back against the cushions. Goldberry leaned forward and began to cut away the stitching she had expertly sewn days before. She nodded, waiting for Fíli to speak.

"Please don't tell Kíli," he said. "I don't want to tell him. He frets enough already about me—it's not natural for him. He shouldn't have to worry about anything."

"It is common for siblings to worry for each other, is it not?" said Goldberry.

"Little brothers aren't supposed to watch over their elders," Fíli replied. "Especially Kíli. He's not made for that." He looked down at Goldberry curiously. "Do you have any siblings, Goldberry?"

Goldberry chuckled and shook her head. "Not in your sense, no," she said. "I have never had to worry over a brother."

"Then I mean no disrespect, but you can't know what it's like," said Fíli. "Kíli is… he's the most important person to me in all of Middle-Earth. It's my job to look after him—not his to look after me. My uncle has said as much, but more than that, I know it in my heart. I knew it the moment I laid eyes on him."

"He did a fine job of watching over you, it seems," Goldberry mused, removing the last bit of stitching and sitting up. Her piercing, ever-changing eyes rested on Fíli.

"Yes, but it's exhausting him," said Fíli. "He's trying as hard as he can, but he's just not meant to watch over me. He doesn't know how. It's not his fault, of course—he's never had to watch over anyone, except Gimli, maybe, and I was always there, too—but I don't think now is a time to start. And especially not like  _this_." Fíli sighed. "That's why I can't tell him. He doesn't know  _how_  to take care of me—and he doesn't need to know. It isn't his responsibility."

"Can't tell him what?" said Goldberry, her eyes burrowing into him.

Fíli looked around warily, but Kíli was nowhere to be seen.

"That it hurts," he said. "It still hurts—a lot. It hurts to move, to sit, to stand, to walk—even to breathe, to be quite honest. I don't want to do anything but lie still."

"You are free to lie still for as long as you would like," said Goldberry, cocking her head to one side.

"But I can't," Fíli protested. "I can't leave my mother and uncle thinking that Kíli and I are lost forever. I won't do that to them. We have to get back as soon as possible."

"It is a long journey home," said Goldberry.

"Well, I'll make it," said Fíli. "I'll do whatever I have to do."


End file.
